Playtests, Design Diaries, Two Sooth Cards, and A Strange Box
almost 8 years ago – Fri, Mar 17, 2017 at 05:59:59 PM

Greetings, vislae!

Things are proceeding well with Invisible Sun. The in-house playtests are going great; Monte's filling up a notebook with ideas, and the players are writing down funny and weird quotes and anecdotes that we'll be able to reveal and explain closer to the game's release date. I'm playing a Vance in one playtest and a Maker in another, and they're both really fun characters with interesting and unique game mechanics.

This week we posted a new design diary from Monte about death in Invisible Sun and how vislae (and some other beings) can exist after death or even return to life. If you've fallen behind on reading the design diaries, you can always look at our What Has Been Revealed So Far article, which collects all Invisible Sun links in one place.

Bear is ready to show off two new pieces of amazing Invisible Sun art.

Today is also the last day of our Strange Box Kickstarter campaign (it ends at 5pm PT). We've been blasting through stretch goals at an incredible pace these past 72 hours, including unlocking new dice and a playmat. If you missed out on the Numenera box, here's your chance for a deluxe box set for The Strange! 

Good luck with your studies, and I hope that you are not drawn back into Shadow…

—Sean

We're adding new components to the Black Cube!
about 8 years ago – Sat, Nov 05, 2016 at 12:08:15 AM

Vislae, we have new information about the Black Cube—and new insights into the design process for Invisible Sun.

More Stuff in Your Black Cube and Vislae Kit

If you haven’t seen it already, yesterday Monte posted the first article in a new design diary for Invisible Sun. Monte plans to post these on a fairly regular basis over the next few months, so if you’re interested in the process keep your eyes on the MCG website.

In today’s article he talks about new innovations in the game’s design that have prompted us to add even more tokens and counters to the game to enhance and ease gameplay. Each Black Cube will contain at least a hundred additional counters beyond what we had originally described, and a cloth bag to hold them. Further, we’ll be adding additional counters and a bag to each vislae kit, so they are an even better deal than before. Again, we’re adding these components to these products with no increase in price for the Kickstarter versions. We just want this to be the best game it can be.

BackerKit Is Open Now—But Closing Soon

BackerKit isn’t news to most of you—over 80% of our backers have completed their surveys. If that’s you, thanks!

If you haven’t done your BackerKit survey, please do so at your earliest convenience—we need this information to fulfill your rewards. (Didn’t get a BackerKit email? Here’s a link.) BackerKit closes on 17 November, so please don’t dawdle.

Whether you’ve done your survey or not, remember that the new components mentioned above—100+ tokens and a cloth bag to keep them in—are being added to the Black Cube and the vislae kit at no extra cost, so this is a great opportunity to add on these titles. And if you know someone who missed the campaign, they can jump in and get a Black Cube or vislae kit through BackerKit as well!

And Now Something for the Rest of the Family

Invisible Sun is a complex, sophisticated, grownup game—but that’s not the only kind of game we make. No Thank You, Evil! is our hit, ENnie-Award-winning RPG for families with kids as young as five, and right now we’re Kickstarting a set of expansion products including Story, Please! (an adventure-building deck) and Uh-Oh, Monsters! (a boxed set featuring new creatures and adventures). The campaign is already funded and hitting its first stretch goals. If you don’t have No Thank You, Evil!, there are backer levels that include the basic game.

The best part? If everything goes to plan, we’ll deliver the first rewards in time for the holidays! The basic game will ship in early December, and assuming no hiccups with Customs or other unforeseen problems, Story, Please! will ship that time as well. So if you’ll be doing any Christmas shopping for gamer kids—or kids who could become gamers—this is a great campaign to back! You can catch an early review of Story, Please! here.

—Charles

One Last Thing, Before I Leave Shadow
over 8 years ago – Thu, Sep 22, 2016 at 03:50:40 PM

Vislae, even now, I make plans and preparations to escape into the Actuality to spend all my time focused on the game and setting that will eventually find its way to you within the Black Cube. However, before I go, I wanted to recommend a few other projects worthy of your esteemed attention. 

Inheritance is an innovative and interesting game by Luke Crane. 

Thornwatch is the latest project of Lone Shark Games, our partners working on the upcoming Ninth World game. It's an interesting-looking RPG/board game hybrid.

Trudvang Chronicles is a Swedish RPG translated into English with phenomenal art.

If you think you might paint your Invisible Sun figurines, these miniatures holders could be helpful. 

Want a cool way to organize all your dice? This bag seems handy. 

Lastly, every vislae wants a new spellbook, right? 

Farewell, friends. I disappear now to put all my energy into this epic project. In the meantime, give generously to beggar angels, but beware generous demons. Do not trust mirrors. Look carefully at both the ants and the spiders. Keep to the path, but recognize that there are, in fact, many paths. 

Remember. 

Escape. 

And when you're done, meet me at Zero's.

We Have Reached the End of the Path—What to Expect from Here
over 8 years ago – Tue, Sep 20, 2016 at 11:01:47 AM

Thank you for your astonishing levels of support in making Invisible Sun a reality. Not only will the Black Cube arrive in November 2017, but it will be followed by a retinue of interesting and exciting support products. And that’s all because of your help. This campaign became the highest funded in Monte Cook Games’ history, and thus in the list of the highest funded tabletop RPG campaigns of all time. (And, my friend Charles will be sad if I do not add, the absolute highest funded campaign for a brand new tabletop RPG setting.)

Let me take a moment to call out the Seekers on the G+ Community, and the Commenters here on the Kickstarter. Not only did you start discovering some of the secrets behind the game, but you shared your own creativity with character ideas, fiction, and more. What a fantastic community this game already has.

And of course, let me thank the MCG team. Everyone pulled together so well and made this Kickstarter a reality, when it was a Kickstarter campaign unlike anything anyone's done before. We blazed a lot of new trails here with the keyfalls, the caches, the secrets, and so much more. But thanks to Bruce Cordell, Dennis Detwiller, Charles Ryan, Tammie Ryan, Bear Weiter, Sean Reynolds, and Shanna Germain, it all went fantastically well.

There's so much more to say, but I'm exhausted. So let me just say this: Kickstarter is all about putting your crazy, never-before-been-done ideas out there to see if anyone will support your project. I put my game idea out there, and while lots of people said, "you can't do a game that way," almost 2,000 of you had faith. Thank you for that. I won't let you down.

It will take some time to produce this intricate game of secrets and lore. Here’s what you should expect.

This Evening and the Next Few Days

Running Kickstarter campaigns is rewarding on many levels, and we have greatly enjoyed interacting with you through these updates, the comments, social media, the puzzles, the mysteries, and so on. But it’s also a brutally hectic challenge to administer it all. And most of the MCG staff has been keeping up with our regular duties throughout—Numenera Character Options 2 is just coming back from the printer now, for example, and the Numenera Starter Set is imminent. Plus, we’re working on new products for the Cypher System, the Strange, No Thank You, Evil!, and more. So I don’t think you’ll be surprised when I say that we’re taking a short break.

Don’t expect to hear much from us this weekend, and it may be quiet even into next week. If you have questions feel free to send a Kickstarter message, but don’t be concerned if you don’t get a response until next week. This is a project of spanning the next two years, and there isn’t anything that can’t wait for a few days. But don’t worry—we WILL get back to you.

The Next Few Weeks

Kickstarter began collecting pledges the moment the campaign closed. It takes Kickstarter a full two weeks to release those funds, along with the data on our backers.

In the meantime, we will get BackerKit fully set up so we can open it when we have that data. BackerKit is a third-party platform that lets you confirm all the information we need to fulfill your pledge. If there are add-ons you’ve missed, or if you decide to increase your reward level, you can do that through BackerKit as well. We’ll open BackerKit in early October.

NOTE: Signing into BackerKit is vital to getting your rewards. Kickstarter does NOT provide us with the information we need to fulfill your rewards; we HAVE to gather it from you after the campaign. If you don’t respond to your BackerKit survey, we can’t send you any rewards!

The Next Few Months

Once you’ve done your BackerKit survey, we won’t need anything else from you to start fulfilling rewards. We’ll be busy crafting the products and rewards that you will be receiving in 2017 and beyond. Playtesting and early access will begin toward the end of this year, but if you have that as part of your rewards, you’ll get more details as they are available.

At times during this period you won’t hear from us, maybe for a couple of months. Please, do not panic—we’ve delivered hundreds of rewards on time in the past, and we’ll be working diligently on yours. 

But at the same time, please pay attention when you do get communications from us. Our emails and Kickstarter updates include critical information about your rewards. 

When the Books Ship

Invisible Sun ships in November of 2017. Most of the add-ons will be available at that same time (or even somewhat before, but wise vislae know that it’s best to combine shipping to save on expenses). Other products will follow over the course of the next year or so. In the weeks before each release, we’ll contact you again to begin the fulfillment process. Generally, we’ll direct you to the MCG shop, where you’ll log in, “buy” the product (for free, because you’ve already paid for it through Kickstarter), and check out. This is an important part of the process because it ensures we have accurate shipping information for every package we send out. (With 1846 backers getting rewards in a span covering two years, it’s amazing how many people will change address over the fulfillment period.) If you’re an overseas backer or want upgraded shipping, you’ll pay for it at that time. Make sure you’re paying attention to communications from us—don’t let our updates or emails go to your spam folder, or otherwise ignore them, because if you do you’ll miss out on some of your rewards. 

This was a grand endeavor and we are very happy you chose to be a part of it. Thank you all for your support, and for letting us continue to make the sort of products we really love. 

Wrong Cat says "thank you" as well. 

The Black Cube is Ascendant
over 8 years ago – Mon, Sep 19, 2016 at 01:15:58 PM

We have, very quickly, reached the goal where the contents of the box are once again upgraded. The four main books in everyone's Black Cube are now larger and hardcover (page count among them will be more than 500) and we are going to add another book: an art book. An exciting moment for all vislae, and we could not have reached it without each and every one of you. Very likely there will be noise complaints about the raucous party at Zero's. Again.

Speaking of Art

While you wait for your art book to arrive next year, you can enjoy some of the art we have already commissioned in our art gallery. We're so lucky to be able to work with such talented artists. Nushara Maak, Goddess of Beautiful and Wondrous Imagery, has blessed us.

Dare We Approach the Edge?

Our next stretch goal is for The Threshold, a hardcover campaign sourcebook with story arcs for your characters and in-depth material about the Actuality and the Labyrinth. We will unlock The Threshold, making it available as an Add-On, as well as including it with the rewards of every caster of Control the Black Cube (with and without a key) and higher level, if we reach $541,160.

What’s the secret of reaching the Labyrinth? And why would you ever want to go there? The Labyrinth is a mystical, metaphorical, ever-changing, always-shifting crucible for testing the cleverest, most powerful, and most adept among the vislae. Crossing its threshold might be akin to suicide, but it also might just be the path to true revelation.

As with all products of Invisible Sun, The Threshold is filled with clues, mysteries, and hidden truths requiring thoughtful study. Carefully hidden within the pages of this book, in fact, might just be the greatest secret of the Actuality . . . What lies beyond the Labyrinth if you pass through it entirely? The only way to find out is to make sure we cross The Threshold. Spread the word. Only you can make it happen.